Re: Re Iraqi CPs positions

["Jose G. Perez" <jgperez@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Peter & all:

I have a lot of issues with the direction, tone and stance of the Iraqui CP
statement and with the green position that you posted. Actually, I disagree
with them *completely,*  I think they are *entirely*  wrong.

The CP says:

"Saddam Huseein's regime has fallen and this is a good thing for the
people of Iraq. Unfortunately, its overthrow is the outcome of US and
its allies' military intervention, not the mobilisation of the Iraqi
people themselves, hundreds of whom have been killed in the war."

The MAIN thing that has happened is NOT that "Saddam Hussein's regime has
fallen" but that Iraq is in the process of being occupied by the
Anglo-American imperialists. This is NOT a "good thing for the people of
Iraq" but a bad thing. A catastrophically terrible thing. And not just for
the people of Iraq but for the Arab world as a whole, and all peoples of the
third world, for all working and oppressed people on the entire planet.
Anyone who doesn't get THAT is beyond hope.

True Iraqi patriots, to the degree that Saddam's regime did not make this
impossible, fought and are continuing to fight the occupation. They
certainly don't *welcome it* with a shameful, capitulationist argument like,
"at least we got rid of Saddam and that was the main thing" because it was
NOT the main thing. This war wasn't about Saddam, that was Bush's lying
claim, and it is distressing to hear it legitimized in the name of Iraqi
communism. And *especially* while at least some Iraqis continue to
heroically resist the occupation arms in hand, setting an example and laying
the groundwork for the mass resistance movement that WILL --sooner or
later-- *expel* the imperialists.

"2. The United Nations must take responsibility for security in the
cities, to enable the people's immediate need for food, water, health
care, safety, etc. to be met, and so that all political parties are able
to present their program to the people so that elections that are free
and fair can be held as soon as possible."

To call on "the United Nations" to take "responsibility for security in the
cities" is to call for the *Security Council* to do so, which means, for all
practical purposes, that the Americans cut in the French, and perhaps the
Germans and Russians for a slice of the Iraqi pie. The General Assembly has
no authority to act on something like this, only the Security Council. The
U.N. provided cover for a continued a low intensity war against Iraq these
past twelve years and prepared the way for the U.S. invasion this year. The
U.N. resolution demanding Iraq disarm and so on from last fall helped Bush
prepare the conditions for the war. This call is like asking that the
Gestapo, after some bloody pogrom,  to remain in charge of "protecting" a
Jewish ghetto in Nazi Germany just as long as they have some Italian troops
with them.

To call for BOTH immediate imperialist (US-Brit-Australian) withdrawal AND
immediate imperialist (US-Brit-Australian-French + maybe some others for
"cover") occupation strikes me as brain dead, at best, although to describe
it politically one would have to say it is craven capitulation and betrayal.
It means sending a bouquet of flowers to Bush to thank him for rescuing the
country from Saddam, and as Sandino said, liberty can't be conquered by
sending flowers.

I do not discount that, in theory, an Iraqui resistance movement *might* at
some point feel compelled to accept some sort of plan  like that on the road
towards ending the occupation, just as the Vietnamese in 1972 made any
number of concessions to achieve their immediate goal of ending the direct
U.S. occupation ground troop occupation of Vietnam. But I suspect a true
resistance movement would demand it be an Arab force. There are many
variants on this theme that could be speculated about, but all that is
pointless now.

It is pointless because the only thing that UN action can do now is simply
legitimize and rubber stamp the U.S. occupation, give it some multinational
cover and a veneer for French diplomatic finesse. Just because the Bushites
are too arrogant or stupid or ambitious about their plans for world conquest
to realize that they could really use some U.N. political cover just about
now should not lead us to overlook what the role of the Security Council
would be, which is --as Che so justly described the OAS-- that of an
American ministry of colonies.

At any rate, it is ONE THING for an Iraqi resistance movement with some
claim to legitimately speak for the nation to make a judgement about
concessions like that, and it is entirely another for an exile party to do
so, never mind non-Iraqi political forces, and most of all non-Iraqis from
the occupying imperialist powers.

The real future of the Iraqi nation, its real representatives, will be those
who organize and struggle against the occupation. Developing that movement
may take time, in the meanwhile, there is absolutely no reason for any
socialist or revolutionary group OUTSIDE that struggle to have any demands
other than immediate, unconditional, complete, total, absolute and utter
withdrawal of ALL U.S., Brit, Australian troops AND pseudo "civilian"
occupiers this very instant.

IMPERIALISTS OUT NOW. That sums it up rather nicely. It is and should remain
the demand of all those who oppose this war.

As to the argument that "some force" must "replace" the occupiers to prevent
looting, chaos, anarchy and so on, we should respond that it is *precisely*
the occupation forces that have explicitly and openly *encouraged* and
*promoted* this. The obvious and traditional operating procedure for
occupying military forces is to impose a curfew and announce that those
violating it risk being treated as enemy irregulars and that looters will be
shot on sight. What is happening in Iraq is not at all "normal" (even if it
isn't unique). What the "coalition"-sponsored lumpen rampage aims to do is
not just to smash, but to pulverize out of existence all expressions of the
Iraqi nation and its state. I also tend to agree with those who say it also
appears to be aimed at destroying the small Iraqi capitalists, i.e., a a key
part of the social fabric on which the state rests and from which it is
nourished.

The imperialist looting operation aims to rapidly have a lumpencapitalist
pirate layer rise to the top of Iraqui society to suffocate it, like a layer
of oil on a pond. The aim of all this is to prevent Iraqi national
sentiment --which is and will be to drive out the invaders-- from finding
organized expression.

I think in our explations it may be permissible to counterpose, in a
tentative, hypothetical, propagdandistic sort of way, the idea of something
like a force from the Arab countries that OPPOSED the invasion taking over
security and other duties INSTEAD OF a force run by the imperialist's
security council. We should remind people that imperialist "opponents" of
the war, like the French and German bourgeoisies and U.S. figures like Jimmy
Carter, expressed themselves in favor of a quick anglo-american imperialist
victory once the shooting started. Such forces prevented the United Nations
from being used as a forum to mobilize world public opinion against this
outrage.

But I don't think this idea --a force from anti-invasion Arab countries-- is
something that should be raised as a *demand* outside the Arab world, and
most of all NOT in the occupying imperialist powers. Rather, I would use the
hypothetical idea as a way of illustrating that there are lots of ways of
dealing with the immediate policing and social organization crisis that do
not involve inviting the Anglo-American imperialists to legitimize their
occupation through the United Nations, (or, viewed another way, that do not
involve trying to mediate between the anglophone imperialists and their
brethren on continental Europe over division of the war booty).

The idea we want to communicate is that anything like a non-Iraqi force must
have as its starting point opposition to, repudiation of, elimination of,
the anglo-american invasion and occupation. The only people *really* in a
position to raise or accept such proposals are the legitimate
representatives of the Iraqi nation, i.e., a genuine mass resistance
movement to the occupation, but absent that, perhaps those brother Arab
countries who defended Iraq by opposing the imperialist attack can play a
role in ENDING the imperialist occupation. But it must be that and that
ONLY: not "softening" the occupation by having Arab troops enforce it on
Bush's behalf or anything else like that.

This is why I say this is NOT a "demand" for us but only a hypothetical,
pedagogical illustration, because what such an Arab force would have to be
is an EXPRESSION and OUTGROWTH of the movement of the Arab masses outside
Iraq against the occupation. It can be considered legitimate because Iraq
forms part of the pan-Arab nation and there is a situation where there is no
force that can claim to legitimately speak for the Iraqi nation. But *we*
must not raise this as a demand, because we cannot substitute for, are not
part of, and have no way to call in to being the pan-Arab national movement
which is the only thing that could give such a force a real anti-occupation
content.

An even more hypothetical and abstract example would be the idea of a force
from Third World nations that condemned the invasion.

I do not believe the East Timor case is even in the tiniest bit analagous to
the situation in Iraq now, in the sense of serving as precedent for our
calling or supporting a call for an "international" force to replace the
occupiers.. THERE an independence movement that had for a quarter century
been battling the imperialist-supported Indonesian occupation, and which
unquestionably was the legitimate representative of the people of East Timor
and had every right to act on their behalf under those circumstances,
negotiated an agreement to end to the Indonesian occupation which involved
the United Nations. Like all such agreements, it involved concession on the
part of the East Timor side reflecting, in the last analysis, the inability
of the independence movement to physically drive out or annihilate the
Indonesian occupiers.

One of those concessions was a timetable for Indonesian withdrawal, and the
Indonesians used that time to organize and inspire, as they pulled out. a
pogrom against the people of East Timor. So it was the independence movement
of East Timor that demanded forces under UN auspices come in to stop the
attacks as the concrete way of living up to and enforcing against the
Indonesian aggressors and occupiers the agreements that Indonesia had been
forced to accept, i.e., the concessions Indonesia had been forced to make.

I thought under those circumstances it was correct to *support the demand of
the independence movement,* and disagreed with some of the formulations in
some of the Green Left articles which tended to raise the issue of sending
troops outside the framework of supporting the demand of the independence
movement for the guarantors of the agreement to enforce it against the
Indonesian occupiers. I believe I noted that nuance at the time, and also
the position of Cuba, which was even more circumspect, stressing, as best I
remember it, that this was a totally exceptional and unique situation and
conditioning their support for the idea.. Unfortunately I've lost those
posts so I can't quote from them here.

That difference over how to best formulate things was, of course,
overshadowed by the debate over whether simply to support or oppose troops
being sent. In my mind, the argument opposing troops that was strongest was
the one set forth by Nestor, if I remember right, and I *think* supported by
Louis and others, who argued quite simply that the interests of East Timor,
legitimate as they may have been viewed in isolation, had to be subordinated
and *sacrificed* to the greater importance of the Indonesian revolution. In
other words, these comrades recognized that even though just from the
framework of East Timor a neocolonial situation would be better than direct
occupation, the economic (and potentially military) base imperialism gained
in the region by helping East Timor detach itself from direct Indonesian
control (which was also imperialist control mediated by the Indonesian
ruling class's state) was much worse for the much weightier Indonesian
revolutionary cause as a whole, more than negating what could be said to be
gained from the formal independence of this relatively small and very weak
state.

While I *still* tend to think my judgement was right in saying that wasn't
the case, in THIS situation, the Iraq situation, I don't have the slightest
doubt in saying that the interests of the Arab and muslim peoples as a whole
in ENDING the imperialist occupation of Iraq absolutely OVERWHELM even the
worst imaginable complete, chaotic situation arising from the withdrawal of
the anglo-american occupiers.

Even if it means the Saddam regime reconstitutes itself (not that I believe
it is possible any longer), THAT would be a far, far preferable situation
for the Arab nation and world revolution than any form of imperialist
occupation, even an extremely attenuated form like an "all Arab" force under
Security Council control composed of quisslings from Qatar, Kuwait and so
on, and even if they manage to draw in some of the Arab states that have
formally opposed the U.S. war to contribute troops to this imperialist
enforcement goon squad.

I would urge the DSP comrades --and everyone else-- NOT to move even one
millimeter away from what I think is the ONLY POSSIBLE revolutionary
position in this case: imperialists out now.

José

P.S.: On the Kurds, which the CP statement raises. I believe by making
themselves tools of the imperialist invasion and occupation, the dominant
Iraqi Kurdish factions, and with them the Kurds of Iraq, have negated the
legitimacy of a Kurdish struggle for separation from Iraq at this stage.
Self-determination for the Kurds is one thing; setting up an American base
run by people of Kurdish origin on the CIA payroll is quite another, and
this is what they have done. And before this gets all dissolved into a mass
of apolitical abstractions about "oppressed peoples" and so on, let us
remember how the dominant factions have consolidated their hold: by acting
as spotters for and giving political cover to imperialist aviation bombing
the factions that had taken an anti-imperialist stance out of existence.

A state formation that could be considered in any sense an exercise in
self-determination is not possible under these circumstances -- not that
there is the slightest possibility the imperialists would give it to them.
That because the Kurdish nation has NO organized expressions through which
it can exercise self determination.

These kurdish factions had a choice, either to fight for their freedom
alongside the working and oppressed peoples of the world, or hope the
Americans would give them a state as their 30 pieces of silver for being
Judases. They chose the path of Judas. Well, not for nothing did Judas wind
up hanging himself. These groups have destroyed themselves as forces with a
legitimate right to claim the right to self-determination on behalf of Iraqi
Kurds. They have no such right because they are not an expression of the
Kurds, but rather an expression of American imperialism. It's that simple.

The path to a legitimate struggle for Kurdish self-determination now goes
through the Iraqi Kurds joining with the rest of the Iraqi masses to drive
out the imperialist occupiers. But while their organized forces act as
mercenaries for the imperialist invaders, they have no cause to complain
about being treated as such. If they break from the imperialists, THEN we
can talk about self determination for the Iraqi Kurds. Any talk NOW of "self
determination" means concretely freedom of action for the CIA. Without a
clean break from the imperialists, it is impermissible.

It may be argued that the right stance of an Iraqi resistance movement would
be to guarantee the Kurds the right to self determination AFTER the
imperialists are driven out. That *conditional* offer (for that is what it
is, really) does not, however, translate into revolutionaries in the
imperialist countries spouting a lot of abstract nonsense about self
determination which *in practice*  can only mean freedom of action for the
imperialists in using those they have signed up to serve as their troops.


----- Original Message -----
From: "Pip, Peter & Zoe" <ppz@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: "Marxism List" <marxism@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Saturday, April 12, 2003 6:39 PM
Subject: Re Iraqi CPs positions